The Arabian Nights Entertainments

There is no occasion to prepossess the reader with an opinion of the merit and beauty of the following work. There needs no more but to read it to satisfy any man, that hitherto nothing so fine of this nature has appeared in any language.What can be more ingenious than to compose such a prodigious quantity of pleasant stories, whose variety is surprising, and whose connexion is so wonderful? We know not the name of the author of so great a work; but probably it is not all done by one hand; for how can we suppose that one man alone could have invention enough to make so many fine things?